COVID pandemic has affected the business and economy across the globe like never before. While many are expecting life to return to normalcy and the businesses to resume into its earlier capabilities, the reality might be quite different. The pre-COVID world may exist only in textbooks and despite the fact that we would want it to return back to normal, that is not happening anytime sooner.
Nitin Jain who is the head of customer experience at Mondelēz International took us through the new normal in data and analytics industry in the coming times during his talk at plugin 2020, the virtual AI conference. He highlighted the behavioural changes that might come into the picture as a result of the new normal. “The kind of transformation that businesses are undergoing is tremendous and the changes that we may have seen in the last 2-3 months is equivalent to the changes that would have otherwise taken 20 years to happen,” says Nitin.
Change Management Is The New Norm
With the changes happening rapidly, new technologies are now welcome more than ever before and companies are looking to invest in software technologies and artificial intelligence and analytics. “With the ongoing pandemic, change is the new norm and companies are moving towards change management to make businesses flourish in these tough times,” he said.
Stressing on change management, he said that businesses will never be the same again. Sooner the companies accept this fact, better will be their chances of coping up with the change that we are yet to witness. “In the coming times, businesses will change, customers will change, models will change, preferences will change. It is about time to accept these and bring new advances to cope up with these changes”, he added.
Moving Towards Touchless Economy
Nitin stressed on the fact the world is moving towards the touchless economy. The focus on essentials will differ with each business sector and the world will strive to conduct businesses in a touchless manner. Having said that AI and analytics will play a crucial role in accomplishing it.
For instance, biotech companies which will have a huge role in the coming days in the development of treatments will also see an increased use of AI and analytical models. Every sector will see an increased investment in AI and analytics. IoT and robotics will also see an increase in the consumer market as a touchless economy becomes more prevalent. “Data will drive the flow of investments competing with human intelligence”, he said.
Not just that, there will be a stress on digital capabilities. Other areas that will see increased adoption are social sciences, natural sciences and more.
In terms of digital technologies, contactless payments will see an increase as it is cheaper, faster and convenient in many ways. Social tools and AI-enabled sales will be the new norm too.
Other areas such as 3D printing, online education, online conferencing, online consultation with doctors, supply chain, deliveries will see changes.
“Analytics and AI will be the key aspect and fundamental to all these changes happening in the coming years. I do not see analytics as a different sector anymore but integrated to all the business functions now,” said Nitin.
Wrapping Up
“The businesses have taken a reformatory route and I see no CXOs that aren’t accepting these changes or talking about it. The industries are in a pause and will bounce back when the time is right. Advanced analytics and recommendation systems will play a crucial role in accomplishing that as AI and data end the world of linearity,” he said on a concluding note.
